Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Unnecessary Jones

Moving Madison Square Garden down the street is about as necessary and well-intentioned as, say, invading Iraq. Sure, some good may come of the decision in the long-run, but it'll more than likely cause significant and avoidable pain for the foreseeable future.

There's no better place in the country to attend a sporting event or see a concert than the self-proclaimed World's Most Famous Arena. Is that New York-centric? Maybe. Are you a fuckin' tool for thinking that? Absolutely. I cite facts, I don't spew half-baked opinion.

It's quite obvious that, through the smokescreen, the Shitty Dolans just want a new building so they can jack up the already ridiculous ticket prices and cram in as many luxury boxes as possible, and the would-be developers of the current MSG plot want increased revenue from some taller commercial buildings.

But the Dolan family needs to be rounded up and each member beaten with an industrial-sized sack of Sacajawea dollars, so I say eff them and their floating plan. The United States, especially New York City, doesn't need another soulless, cavernous arena built solely with revenue streams in mind. Anyway, here are the details:

"Under the proposed agreement, the Garden would move to the western half of the block-long James A. Farley Building, the post office that is being transformed into a $930 million transit hub to be a gateway to New York City... Moving the Garden would open up the possibility of transforming the dowdy site where the Garden now sits, on Eighth Avenue between 31st and 33rd Streets. The developers... would replace the current arena with a pair of skyscrapers and an elaborate glass skylight that would open up the crowded Pennsylvania Station down below, according to the officials and executives."

Head on over to this Curbed post for more on the ludicrously misguided proposal to slide MSG further on up the road.

2 Comments:

some epic band, maybe one that hasn't played together very much in recent years, from somewhere... say... maybe... vermont, or something like that, should buy the old MSG and turn it into a permanent home.

80 dates/year, mostly on weekends and holidays-- with the time inbetween shows used to create an ever-evolving, all-encompassing, interactive, psychedlic art exhibit that fills every part of the building. franco dragone as head-consultant.

guest artists could come in and do exhibits, etc...

if mystere can sell out 600 shows/year, this could fill the garden 50-80 times.